Whistle from the Far Off Yesterday
by MorganD
Summary: The day after Sensui's defeat. Hiei wakes up for a not so pleasant reality. Shounen Ai.


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Whistle from the **Far Off Yesterday**   
_by _[_Morgan D._][1]

~*~

**__**

Yu Yu Hakusho and all its characters belong to Yoshihiro Togashi, Shueisha, Studio Pierrot, Fuji TV and Jump Comics. Unfortunately, they're simply too cute and I just can't get my mind off them for more than twenty minutes. _Can you blame me?_

__

Shounen Ai.

~*~ 

The nothing. The beautiful, fresh, relieving nothing. 

Hiei contracted his eyelids, trying to hold on to the nothing as long as he could. But he knew it was useless. It had always been like that. The very moment he recognized the heavenly peace of unawareness, he lost it, his mind being abruptly flooded with light and noise and smell, the sound of his heart beating and the weary questioning of why it did. 

The effects of the Black Dragon Wave were wearing off, and he woke up. 

__

Kuso! 

However, as he forced the ocean of memories to calm down in a slightly logic picture and summoned the most recent ones forward, the corners of his mouth curved up in a dreamy smile. 

Kurama, astounding in his silver Youko form, hovering elegantly in the air on the butterfly-leaves of one of his rare demonic plants. 

Yusuke, returning from death mounted in that blue phoenix that shared part of his soul, then acquiring the long wild mane and the proud body marks of his youkai ancestors while he fought Sensui. 

And Makai. The Gusha Forest. The deserts, the cliffs, the mountains he knew. The world he belonged. He, the alluring Youko Kurama and that wonderful surprise called Toushin Yusuke. Life was good. 

He savored the idea for a few seconds more, then let his smile disappear in a bitter scowl. He knew better than trusting blessings, specially such a perfect one. Something **_had_** to be awfully wrong in that picture. He would find out what as soon as he dared to open his eyes. 

So he didn't. 

He called himself a stupid coward, but he kept his eyelids closed tight. Reality would call him back in its own time. 

It didn't take long. "You're scowling, Hiei," Yusuke's joyful voice laughed somewhere to his left. "Does that mean you're awake?" 

The Jaganshi braced himself, counted to three and opened his eyes. 

It couldn't be worse. 

The bluish white ceiling above him wasn't much of a surprise. The fluffy surface he was lying on clearly indicated pillows and sheets, hence a bed. And for as hard as he had tried to ignore it, he had already noticed that the smell filling his nostrils wasn't the loving scent of blood and rotten flesh that characterized the Makai, but the familiar perfume of herbs and roses of Kurama's bedroom. 

He wasn't home anymore. 

But when he turned his head towards Yusuke's voice, the sight almost made him cry. 

The boy was sitting on a chair facing the bed, with a small towel around his neck and shoulders. He wore a sleeveless tee-shirt and new pants, not the jeans that were totally ruined by Sensui's attacks. Behind him stood Kurama, in the red-haired aspect of Shuuichi Minamino, wearing that horrible school uniform of his, armed with comb and scissors. 

He was cutting the Toushin's long wild hair. 

"Don't do that!" Hiei gasped, sitting up in one of his quicker-than-the-eye moves. Unfortunately his body was still weak with exhaustion, and a wave of dizziness made him sick to his stomach. "Ouch..." 

"Easy, Hiei!" Kurama soothed. "The fight is over, we're home, it's all right. You can relax now." 

Hiei stared at him in bewilderment, as if the Youko had completely lost his mind. "Fuck you, Kurama, why did you do this? And why are you doing **_this_**?" He pointed to the floor under Yusuke's chair, protected with newspaper and covered with thick long tresses of chestnut hair. 

Kurama grimaced. The Fire Demon was a pain when he woke up in a bad mood. 

"I asked him to," Yusuke put in, before the Youko could answer. 

Hiei's eyes widened, his lips trembled. "What? Why?" He reached out to touch Yusuke's forearms, lifted the towel to see his shoulders, then looked up at the boy's cheeks. "They're gone," he gaped. 

Yusuke blinked, less surprised with Hiei's strange behavior than with the caring touch of his friend's hands on his arms. "Ahn? Oh, you mean the marks," he realized. "Yup, they're gone. Faded away while I was sleeping." 

"Faded?" The Jaganshi seemed so utterly upset, as if he had lost his best friend. 

"Ofukuro is disappointed too," Yusuke told him in a warm reassuring tone. "She thought they were super-cool." 

Kurama sniggered. "Jeez, **_my_** mother would have had a seizure." He prepared to cut another lock of Yusuke's hair. 

"Stop!" Hiei barked. "What do you think you're doing?" 

The Youko halted, puzzled. "What is wrong with you, Hiei?" 

"Come on, Hiei," Yusuke frowned. "This mane looks more like a rug carpet glued to my head than anything. I can't go to school like this." 

Hiei stared blankly at him, mesmerized. "School?" 

Urameshi faced him in silence. That word had the most peculiar sound in Hiei's disbelieving voice. It sounded almost as senseless and ridiculous as in his own spirit. 

"Sensui is dead," Kurama asserted, resuming the haircut. "The Tokubetsu Boueitai is closing down the tunnel between Makai and the human world, by Enma-daiou's orders. Life goes back to normal. Yusuke has to graduate." 

Yusuke moaned. "Damn, you sound just like Keiko..." 

Sitting back on the bed, Hiei contemplated the scene in stupefaction, as more and more of the wild brown hair fell dead on the floor. He felt as if he was watching a spider being slowly killed by a wicked child who snatched its thin legs one by one. 

"Kaasan is out at work," Kurama informed him. "If you wanna go downstairs and find something to eat... You must be hungry." 

He was. Starving. But the mutilation spectacle - that's how Hiei defined it - kept him hypnotized, frozen in mute consternation. 

The heavy gaze was beginning to bother the redhead. "Listen, Hiei, you're probably a little disoriented yet. I'll tell you what happened. After you fainted, Sensui didn't live much longer. Itsuki showed up and took his body away with him, Inari-knows-where. So we all mounted on Puu and he brought us back through the tunnel. Everybody went home to sleep." 

Urameshi smirked. "Except for our favorite nerd, Shuuichi Minamino, who went straight to school." 

Kurama shrugged. "I missed enough classes with our wanderings in the Mushiori City. Anyway, we thought best to let you sleep in my bedroom." 

Hiei sighed. _And you probably came up with some very logical and complicated excuse for it, instead of saying, "Well, he's my lover, he's used to my bed."_

"I left the window open," Kurama proceeded, "in case you woke up. I came home one hour ago expecting to find you gone, but instead you were still sound asleep, and our favorite rug carpet, Yusuke Urameshi, was sitting on this chair begging for a haircut." 

Yusuke laughed at the smart retort, and silently thanked Kurama for omitting how he had **_really_** found him: staring down at the Fire Demon, in complete fascination for the soft and vulnerable features of that childlike face. It would be hard to explain, and awkward, since Yusuke had no idea of how to do it. "Where else should I go? I don't trust Ofukuro with scissors. I'm very familiar with the hairstyle of Keiko's dolls, and no thanks. And any barber in this town would be scared out of his skin if I showed up in a barbershop like this." 

"Don't fret," the redhead smiled. "I was just surprised that you used the window. If none of my friends is going to use the front door anymore, my neighbors will eventually find out that there is something weird about me." 

"Something weird?" 

Hiei's astonished murmur was a sharp intrusion in their good mood. 

"There's nothing weird about you, Kurama," the youkai stated. "You're a perfectly normal demon." The Youko's tall silver image crossed his mind, leaving a trail of glittering golden purpurine in its track. _Yes... you're perfect..._

"Please, Hiei, don't start with this again," Kurama groaned. 

Yusuke knitted his brows. _Again?_

"You can do it whenever you want, don't you? Hiei inquired. "You grew more powerful when Yusuke died. You don't need the Fruit of Past Lives to summon your Youko aspect anymore." 

"It doesn't change a thing," Kurama countered. "Don't you listen to anything I say?" 

"Ow, ow, ow! Wait a second, guys!" Urameshi protested. "What the hell are you talking about?" 

Hiei shifted his glare from Kurama to him, and Yusuke instantly regretted having interfered. "And why are **_you_** sneaking in through windows now?" 

"What's wrong with it? Can't I do it just because it's your trademark?" Yusuke wanted it to sound disdainful, but even to his own ears the reply seemed nothing but poorly defensive. "I can't walk on the streets looking like this." 

"Right," Hiei agreed, "You're not human anymore." 

They kept facing each other for a long silent minute, during which the only sound that could be heard in the room was the scissors' frenzied chik-chik. Annoyed to his bones, Kurama refused to stop his task for more of his lover's non-sense about leaving Ningenkai. 

"Hiei..." Yusuke began, uncertain of how to continue the sentence. 

He didn't have to bother. "Why did you bring me back?" Hiei cut him off. 

"What?" 

"Why did you bring me back?" he repeated angrily. "I told you I wanted to go back to my world!" 

Yusuke pursed his lips. "C'mon, Hiei, you didn't mean it." 

"I am a demon, Yusuke! I don't belong here! And neither do you!" 

For the first time since he awoke in Irima Cave, Urameshi really missed the beat of his human heart. If it were still alive, it would be throbbing madly by now. But the demonic core that worked as a heart for him now had a different pulse, a different sound, and a different way of reacting. "This is my home," he whispered. 

"Is it?" 

Yusuke didn't feel enough strength in his words to repeat them. 

"Let me guess," Hiei smirked, with not a bit of humor. "You don't wanna leave your mamma alone here." 

"Hiei!" Kurama hissed, pointing the scissors at him warningly. That was dangerous ground and the Jaganshi knew it too well. 

"I can't believe you two," Hiei muttered. "How long do you think you'll be able to maintain this charade?" 

"You tell me how long **_you_** will keep Yukina in the dark," Kurama snapped back. 

"Leave Yukina out of this," Hiei stood up menacingly. "Every time you feel threatened by something I say, you bring Yukina up. It's a low trick, even for you." 

"Now what's **_that_** supposed to mean?" 

"Oi shut up, will ya?" Yusuke shouted. "Guys, you quarrel like a married couple, did you know that?" 

Either by some mysterious insight or simply because of his incredible luck, Urameshi found the one comment good enough to hush both contenders at once. Hiei sat on the bed again, glaring at one corner of the room. Kurama removed the towel from Yusuke's shoulders, gently brushing off the tiny hair scraps from his neck. "It's done, Yusuke." 

The boy groped his nape, relieved in getting rid of the heavy hot mane. He had never had long hair in his whole life, and had no idea how Kurama could stand it. Especially in the middle of a fight. "Thanks. You have a mirror?" 

Kurama indicated the closet's, which had a large mirror nailed to the inner side of the door. Urameshi took a peek at himself, satisfied. "Wow, that's great." 

"Yeah," Hiei muttered. "Just paste it with that sticky jelly of yours and you'll be able to fool everyone." Then, with a sad gaze at the Youko, he added, "Even your own mother." 

Yusuke swallowed a bitter thought. When Hiei had initiated the last sentence with 'even your', he had expected to hear "Even yourself." _Should I have stayed in Makai? But what about Ofukuro, Keiko, Kuwabara...? _**This**_ is my home._ But the echo of Hiei's deep voice blew faint whispers in his ears. _Is it?_

But if it wasn't, then **_where_** was it? Makai? A place where he had been during, what? Half a day? "Hiei, you don't understand..." 

"Which part you think I don't understand?" The youkai smiled, but sorrow was all that could be read in his expression. "Not having a home? Not feeling complete anywhere? That gloomy sensation that whatever you do will be the wrong choice?" 

Yusuke gasped, automatically glancing at Hiei's brow to see if the Jagan was beaming under the bandanna. It wasn't. 

Noticing the glance, Hiei smiled a little more sincerely. "Welcome to the world of the half-breeds, Yusuke Urameshi." 

__

Half-breeds... Koenma was not able to explain much of how did he get to have youkai genes. Or why he, from all the past and future generations of Urameshis, had to be the one to carry an active youkai gene. Or who the hell was the nosey entity who butted in his duel against Sensui. There were too many questions still unanswered. 

Kurama had leaned back against the wall beside the open window, hands in his pockets, in that aloof way of his that signaled he was dangerously pissed off. Hiei gazed down at all that hair scattered on the floor, and Yusuke felt a spear of anguish crossing his chest when he thought that he was letting the little Fire Demon down - though he wasn't quite certain how. 

"Why are you so mad at me? You sound like I'm betraying you or something. Is it because I didn't leave you in Makai?" 

Hiei slid down to the floor, taking one of the tresses between his hands and caressing it as if it was a pet's fur. "It's not me who you're betraying." 

The throbbing of a demonic core was far more disturbing than of a human heart. That was what Yusuke learned when he saw that unrecognizable Hiei fondling his cut hair as Yukina would cuddle a stray kitten. _I'm crazy. I have to be crazy. Or having the most surreal dream ever._

He crouched next to Hiei, his cheeks burning. "It wasn't me," he stuttered. "Someone else blew that last Reigan against Sensui. It was another ki, not mine. The hair, those body marks... they're not mine." 

The Jaganshi remained quiet, letting the chestnut locks curl around his fingers, his eyes downcast. Yusuke glanced up at Kurama for support, but to all practical effects the Youko wasn't there anymore - only a pretty empty shell rested there to be seen. 

"What do you want, Hiei?" Yusuke murmured helplessly. "You wanted me to stay in Makai with you? The two of us, plus Kurama?" 

It was Hiei's turn to look for any reaction from the redhead. He also got none. 

"What about Kuwabara?" Yusuke demanded. 

Hiei faced him with a scornful grimace. 

"Don't look at me like that," Urameshi chided. "I don't buy that bickering between you two. And he's part of the team." 

"But I am not," the youkai reminded him calmly. 

The incessant pounding of that demonic heart was giving Yusuke a stabbing headache. "You don't mean it, I know." 

Hiei snorted. "You keep saying that." 

"Don't be stubborn, Hiei." 

"I'm free of my parole, I have no obligations to Reikai or Koenma or you anymore." 

"Forget Reikai," Urameshi snapped. "Enma-daiou gave the order to execute me anyway." 

"So why don't you go to the one place where he will never reach you?" 

Yusuke stood up in a huff. "This is leading us nowhere." 

"You're telling **_me_**," Hiei muttered. 

Catching his jacket from the desk, where he had dropped it when Kurama agreed to cut his hair, Yusuke moved to the window. He had to get out of there and think. Think a lot. And alone. "Thanks, Kurama," he murmured. 

"No charge," was the short but not-so-hostile reply. Yusuke rejoiced knowing **_he_** wasn't the target of the Youko's animosity. _Good luck, Hiei_, he sniffed. 

Dressing the jacket, he felt the solid volume in one of the inner pockets, and cursed under his breath. He had forgotten all about it. 

For a moment he thought of leaving right away, taking the object with him. But that would gain him nothing, wouldn't ease his own anger, and it would ruin a small chance of keeping Hiei from feeling so betrayed. And also would get Enma-daiou mad as hell. An easy decision. Yusuke loved easy decisions. They seemed to be getting scarcer nowadays. 

"Hiei?" 

The Fire Demon gazed up at him. 

__

Gods, he looks so old! The youkai had looked so young while he slept. _I wonder how old he really is..._ Yusuke took out the object from his pocket and put it standing on the windowsill. A VCR tape. 

The Dark Chapter. 

Hiei's ruby eyes widened in surprise. They had made a tacit agreement before entering the Irima Cave. The Jaganshi would help to save Kuwabara and could try to snatch the Dark Chapter from Sensui -Yusuke wouldn't interfere. But Hiei had given up any chance to grab the tape when he charged up the second Kokuryuuha. Sure someone would get it and return it to Koenma long before he woke up. 

Now **_that_** was far more than 'not interfering'. A lot more than their mute deal implied. 

Savoring the startled look on Hiei's face, Yusuke offered him an impish wink. "Ja!" Turning to the window, he leaped and landed easily on the garden. 

Hiei couldn't help smiling. Yusuke looked perfectly human now, and Kurama's mother wasn't home. And still he chose the window instead of the front door. 

"You deliberately planned the whole thing," Kurama's low voice accused. 

The youkai blinked. "What?" 

"You care too much about Yusuke. You would never let him down." 

Hiei entwined his fingers even more in the brown hair lock. "Jealous, Fox?" He knew youkos were somewhat possessive by nature - or maybe 'territorial' would be a better term to define it -, no matter if they embraced and propagandized promiscuity as the perfect lifestyle. It was not the first time Kurama made dubious comments about Yusuke. It didn't mean a thing, and Hiei was sure the redhead wouldn't complain, not for real, if he actually found another lover. Especially since their relationship was just a little more than a business arrangement between two friends in penury of sex and affection. 

The Youko ignored the suggestion. "You pretended not to care about his kidnapping so Botan would bribe you and free you from your parole." 

"You think so?" 

"You were there all the time, weren't you?" Kurama hissed. "You made us look for you for hours, then played your I-don't-give-a-damn act, until Botan was so despaired she would give you anything to convince you to go with us." 

Hiei laughed. "You give me too much credit. That's your kind of strategy, not mine." 

Kurama frowned, still suspicious. 

"I was taking a nap in the park when you, Botan and Kuwabara showed up," Hiei told him earnestly. "I had no idea you were looking for me." 

"Why did you take so long to respond then?" inquired the Youko. 

"Because you're all getting too used to have me waiting for your orders whenever you call me. I'm not their servant, and I'm not your pet. You deserved to sweat a little. Not my fault if Botan is one of the worst bargainers I ever met." 

"How fortunate for you," Kurama muttered. "I can't believe you risked Yusuke's life just to humor your pride." 

The youkai stood up, stepping so close from Kurama that their toes touched. "Weren't you mad at me a minute ago because you think I care too much about him?" 

Kurama didn't bother to answer. 

"How should I know why you were looking for me?" Hiei argued. "I didn't know about the kidnapping. But you did, and don't tell me you weren't humoring your pride too." 

The redhead gasped. "Me? Now where did you get **_that_** idea?" 

"**_Why_** did you take hours looking for me? You know I usually spend the late afternoons in the park. You even know my favorite spots there." 

"It didn't occurred to me," Kurama shrugged. 

"Really?" 

Any other person would have punched that sarcastic smile, so close and defiant. Kurama held on. "If I were to humor my pride don't you think I would have snapped my fingers as soon as Kuwabara asked about you? "Hiei? Sure, I know where he is! I'm omnipresent and omnipotent!"" 

Hiei chuckled. "You're too foxy. You preferred to protect your reputation from revealing to the others that you know me so... intimately." 

Kurama's eyes darkened, his features froze in a mask of ambiguity. "You're delirious." 

The Fire Demon recognized all the signs of danger, but didn't retreat. "It was quite funny, you know. Especially when you asked Botan if **_she_** had any hair, nail or piece of clothing of mine." He sniggered, pinching one black hair from Kurama's uniform. 

The Youko undressed the uniform's jacket, throwing it on the bed. "You're worse than a dog, with that sticky fur of yours." 

Their eyes locked perilously, wild winds clashing in the vicious storm of wrath and youki that formed in the small distance between them. The air vibrated with the crackling of the static caused by their powers' collision, spiraling around them and firing dire sparks as they breathed. The mute duel endured long minutes yet, before they closed the space between them and let their youki dissipate when they kissed. 

Not much of a kiss. Long, soft, urgent, but no more than a satiny touch of their lips, and when they parted it, they couldn't stand to face each other. So Kurama pulled the little demon into a tender embrace. 

Hiei leaned on him, raising his arms to caress his lover's shoulders, and noticed the strand of Yusuke's hair still entangled between his fingers. "Foxy Fox," he sighed. "You did it again, didn't you?" 

Stroking the brawny back under the black ragged tanktop, Kurama bent his head to bit Hiei's earlobe. "What?" he whispered blandly. 

"Got away from my accusations by accusing me first." 

"What do you want to accuse me of?" 

Hiei breathed in the passionate rosy scent of Kurama's clothes, for the zillionth time pondering what in blazes was that uncanny alchemy between them. "Why did you bring me back?" 

"I couldn't leave you there." 

"Why? You wanna stay here, fine. You know what I think of it. But I belonged there, and you know it." 

"Baby, why do you want to go back?" Kurama asked tiredly. "There's nothing in Makai for you now. Your sister is here, your friends are here, and I am here..." 

"It's not enough, Fox..." 

"Then what do you want?" 

Hiei closed his eyes, nestling further inside the protective hug, looking for a kind of warmth he couldn't find there. 

"It wasn't my decision, baby, for what it's worth," said Kurama, kissing the youkai's small shoulder. "It was Puu who put you on his back just as soon as you fainted, and took care of you all the way back through the tunnel. And you know that Puu does nothing that doesn't match with Yusuke's feelings." 

__

Yusuke... He and you are making this so hard... Hiei sighed out miserably. 

"And Kuwabara carried you back from the Irima Cave to my bed. He wouldn't let anyone else do it." 

Hiei snorted. The big oaf probably wanted to prove his manly strength to Botan... 

Very gently, he disengaged from the hug. Still not facing Kurama. 

The redhead knelt down to gather the newspaper and the pile of brown hair from the floor. Yusuke had thought about getting some cash by selling the cut tresses to a wig shop, but Kurama had been against it, since that hair was formed of demonic cells of unknown origin. There was no guarantee that those strands wouldn't become eerie weapons all of a sudden. Kurama would burn them and bury the ashes. Most likely that was overkill, but why to take chances? 

When he stood up, carrying the newspaper as a basket, Hiei loosed the tress from his fingers and drop it on the pile. "I thought you'd keep it as a souvenir," Kurama smiled. 

"Souvenirs are just dead weight to carry," the youkai smirked, "and I don't have many pockets." He turned away, stepping on the windowsill. 

"Hiei, wait!" 

The Jaganshi halted, but did not look back. _Please, don't ask me to stay_, he pleaded mentally. _Don't ask me where I'm going, don't ask me how long I'll be gone, don't ask me to come back soon. Please, let me go._

"The tape," Kurama reminded him. "Aren't you taking it with you?" 

Hiei glanced at the Dark Chapter, still lying on the windowsill where Yusuke had left it. He'd bet anything that Kurama wished to return it to Koenma before Hiei could watch it. That was what a good nice human who worked as a Reikai Tantei would do. 

"I'll come back later to get it," he told his lover, and leaped to the nearest tree. 

****

~*~ 

Something was going on in Yukina's mind. Something complex, and unpleasant. 

That was all that Hiei could tell, even after watching her for ten hours. She attended dutifully to all her tasks in the old shihan's temple, tended to the garden in the back of the house talking soothingly to all and each plant, as she always did. She changed the water for the birds and left small pieces of fruit to all those little fluffy animals she was so fond of, and swept the rooms singing softly to herself, as she always did. And when all was done and shining and fed, she sat on the top of the stairway, like every sunset. 

But there was something different in her. Nothing he could define, just a vague sense of... of... aloofness? Yukina, aloof? 

Hiei felt the air too heavy to breathe. He fought the irrational impulse of getting down from his hiding place on that treetop and ask his little sister who or what was bothering her, so he could burn him/her/it to ashes. Why would she ever tell him anyway? He meant nothing to her, just a friend of her friends, if that much. And he was not the kind of guy that people felt readily comfortable to trust and be with. 

Okay, Kurama had been an exception. So had Yusuke. At least after Hiei stopped threatening to slaughter them. 

__

I do have a knack for weird relationships, don't I? Probably something inscribed on his genes... 

The sun had vanished long ago, and Yukina didn't move. Luckily Genkai had lighted the lanterns in front of the house, so Hiei could still see her, even if he felt so frustrated for not being able to read her thoughts. 

Suddenly she slid his fingers under the obi of her kimono, and took out a piece of paper. Hiei tensed. _K'so, Kuwabara has been sending her love letters again?_ Fortunately Yukina, being a Koorime, had no means to understand the fuss that big clumsy clown made around her. 

The Ice Maiden kept staring sadly at the paper for more than an hour, and Hiei prayed that this meant the end of Kuwabara's aspirations for good. But after that time, a resolute expression took hold of her beautiful face, and she folded the paper carefully, returning it to the rumple in her kimono and running back to the temple. 

Hiei had hoped that she would get rid of that paper. It was not the first time he caught her holding those little papers in her hands contemplatively. Souvenirs were dead weight and her clothing didn't even have real pockets. 

That thought, of course, led him inevitably to the memories of his long quiet hours contemplating his teargem. 

He scratched the bandanna in an annoyed gesture. That damned Jagan itched miserably from time to time. One thing Shigure never thought to mention to him. 

Shigure. _It's been so long since I last thought of him..._ But his image lay firmly in his perfect memory, undisturbed by the passing of time, just as clear and frightening as if they had met yesterday. The laconic surgeon had a peculiar way of looking at him. Probing, curious, almost cynical, but distant. Hiei felt like a pitiful spectacle under those eyes. _He probably knew me better than Kurama does now._

Of course, the young Fire Demon hadn't been able to hide much from him. Shigure didn't agree to perform the Jagan implant before Hiei had revealed almost everything he knew about himself. The questions proposed were simple: "who are you?" "what are you?" "what do you want?" and "why?" Hiei felt no difficulties answering the first two, in spite of forcing him to keep talking incessantly for four days. It was the first time in his life that he had ever spoken for longer than five minutes. Quite ironic was to think that he had started the recitation with "There's no much to tell." Hn. 

He remembered the thrilled fascination of hearing the burning torrent of words leaving his mouth, as if he was recreating himself right in front of him as he spoke, being able to study from outside the crude shape and poor material he was made of. Then he would seek Shigure's face for a disgusted or pitied impression, and find none. 

It wasn't something he could easily do again. 

The first crack in that methodically detached mask appeared when they got to the third question. That was answered in half a minute. 

__

"I want the Jagan. To find the Glacier where I was born. To find my teargem." 

Perhaps Shigure expected more, for he remained silent and immobile for an hour more, just staring at the little youkai. But Hiei had nothing else to say and kept staring back, wondering if he was able to control his facial muscles as well as the surgeon. He hoped so. 

After that hour, the left corner of Shigure's lips curved slightly upward. Hiei felt his heart thrumming in his chest, as he made his best to keep his eyebrows as still as possible. 

Shigure moved on to the fourth question. 

The answer was ready in Hiei's lips. 

__

"To kill all the koorime." 

The lips were frozen in that lopsided ambiguous grin, but the eyes narrowed. _"And?"_

Hiei gulped. _"To see my sister."_

But that wasn't enough to the surgeon. _"And?"_

Hiei gazed at him, for the first time really measuring him. Who was that guy? What was he thinking? What was he after? The Fire Demon examined all those piercings and weird ornaments, and the ugly scars. A surgeon, with so many stitched scars on his face? What was the catch? What was the right answer, the one that would convince Shigure to give him the Jagan? 

He didn't know. Shigure claimed he was 'judging' his life, but offered no clue on what the basis for such a judgement consisted. Which left Hiei with the only option of saying the truth, or not. 

__

"I need my teargem back." 

Again the surgeon kept that heavy motionless stare over him, this time for longer than Hiei could stand. The youkai expected the obvious 'why?' again, since he was quite aware his last answer didn't answer a thing. But that 'why?' didn't come and Hiei could find nothing to add either. So, when another mute hour completed around them, Hiei got on his feet and moved to the door, determinate to find his goals on his own. 

__

"I will perform the surgery." 

Hiei turned, startled. 

Shigure was eyeing him with a vague smirk. _"For a price."_

The youkai snorted. Of course. 

__

"You will never reveal your identity to your sister." 

Frowning suspiciously, Hiei stepped back to the place where he had been sitting before, but remained standing up. _"What's your gain with that?"_

__

"The certainty of a job well done," he replied, now with a true, broad, warm smile. 

And that sentence, just as the whole reason why Shigure agreed to implant the Jagan on his brow, was still a mystery to Hiei. But he had to admit he never wasted much time brooding about it. The price concurred with his own intentions, since he didn't want to have anything to do with his sister, just to see if she was alive and okay. 

And unbelievable as it seemed, that had really been Shigure's only demand as payment. The fencing classes had been something else. So had been the sex. Something else. 

__

Weird relationships, he mused, leaving the treetop and hopping to the ground. 

And now... 

Yukina was safe there in Ningenkai, surrounded by people who would protect her at any cost. All he could ever do for her sake, he had done already. 

The Glacier could either melt down in the air or live forever as the giant hovering grave it was, for all he cared. The koorime were all dead already, they were born to be permanently dead during all their cold dull existence, and he felt no whim to alter their fate. Killing them would be a blessing they didn't deserve. 

And his teargem... Dead weight, forever lost on the muddy bottom of one of the countless rivers and lakes of Makai. 

So... that was it. Right? 

He was ready to leave. To move on. 

Except for the fact that he had nowhere to go. 

"Hiei," called an old familiar voice at his back. 

The youkai managed to control himself and not jump, startled. Barely. _K'so, the woman is good!_ He didn't turn, giving himself time to regain his composure. "What?" 

"Did I scare you?" Genkai snickered. "I'm sorry. But I must be careful with trespassers." 

"Hn." 

"Though you show up to watch over Yukina so often, I should have gotten used to it by now." 

Hiei cursed under his breath. _Too damn good..._ "If you never bothered with me before, why now?" 

"I wanted to see if you're all right." 

At **_that_**, he had to turn and face her. "Why?" he asked quizzically. 

"That tape is dangerous, Hiei," she warned. 

He shoved his hands on his pockets. So she knew. Not that it mattered now. If he knew Kurama, the tape was already locked under a thousand chains and spells in a secret coffer in Enma-daiou's private chambers. "You're worried that I'll try to open another tunnel to Makai?" 

Genkai shook her head. "You are not a flimsy human with an impressionable mind. I'm sure you're already quite acquainted with the Evil a heart can store within." 

Hiei scowled. _What does she know about me?_ "So what's your concern here?" he defied her. 

She stared at him with quiet firmness. "I'm afraid you'll use that tape to hurt yourself." 

Arching his eyebrows, he stepped away from her. "I have no idea of what you're talking about." 

"I had a friend, many years ago," she told him. "A friend who was very dear to me. But when he had to face all the darkness and stupidity a single heart can carry, he found no other path to his life than selling his soul and seeking for his own destruction. That is not a path for you, Hiei." 

"And what do you want me to do?" he shrugged. "Be a good nice boy and return the tape to Koenma?" 

Genkai laughed, turning to leave. "I would never want to see you turned into a good nice boy. You'd lose all your charm." 

****

~*~ 

If Hiei expected that the night would end the surprises in store for him, he was soon proved wrong. It was long past midnight when a quick leap led him up to a tall branch of the cherry-tree in Kurama's garden. All the lights of the house were off, but the window to his lover's bedroom was still open. 

And the Dark Chapter was still there, untouched. 

Puzzled, Hiei jumped to the windowsill and crouched there, glaring at the tape. _What the hell...?_

"Baby?" 

Turning to where the drowsy voice had come from, he discerned the redhead figure shifting lazily under the bedcovers. The youkai stepped into the dark room and stood beside the bed, his face grimacing in a weird mix of confusion and tenderness. "Why, Fox?" 

Kurama sat up, smoothing the covers. "You're not my pet," he pursed his lips. "I won't make your decisions for you." 

Hiei tried to smile, but he found himself unexpectedly incapable of doing it. He had the spooky feeling that that was the worse thing Kurama could have said to him... 

"You know what you're gonna do?" asked the Youko. 

The youkai trembled. "Genkai warned me not to watch it," he murmured. 

"Will you?" 

Hiei stared at the rectangular black shape silhouetted on the windowsill, and a thrill ran down his spine. _Whatever you do will be the wrong choice..._

Kurama saw him shivering and lifted the covers invitingly. "You're cold, baby? Come here. Let's get warmed." 

Without a second thought, the half-koorime plummeted into Kurama's embrace. 

****

~*~ 

There was something out of balance between them. Hiei could feel it in his guts, even if he couldn't quite put a finger on the problem. One thing was clear though: they were again having sex purely out of despair. 

But differently from their first time, the reasons for such a wild despair weren't out in the open. Then, it had been loneliness and fear, spiced by the restlessness of sixteen years of sexual abstinence from the part of the Youko. Now what were they so afraid of? Why did they clutch to each other as if their world was about to be consumed by infernal flames? 

What if **_that_** was exactly what was about to happen? 

Kurama finally - unwittingly and dolefully -let go of Hiei, allowing the Fire Demon to sink tiredly on the pillows and sheets. The Youko sat beside him, rearranging his sweat-damp red mane while studying his friend and lover's childlike face. They breathed deeply, slowly, since in several times along their lovemaking they simply forgot to do it. Inside such furious tight hugs, it had been almost impossible to breathe. Hiei kept his eyes closed, listening to his throbbing heart gradually calming down its pace. He smelled snow in the air - a misfit in that warm night in Ningenkai. 

"You're different," murmured Kurama's soft silky voice. 

Hiei sighed longingly before opening his eyes. In the dim light coming from the lampposts outside, Kurama's face was unreadable, and his green irises seemed unnaturally yellowish. Or golden. 

"I'm the same, just as I've always been," Hiei denied, vaguely wondering if that sounded as phony to the redhead as it had to his own ears. 

"No, I mean, you're different," Kurama frowned slightly. "From the others." 

"What others?" 

The frown intensified. "All others. Everyone I've met. Everyone I've been with. You're different." 

Hiei snorted. "How many half-Koorime Jaganshi Forbidden Children did you sleep with?" 

Kurama shook his head, staring fiercely at him. "It's nothing of that. It's... you. **_You_** are different." He sounded perplexed, as if not sure of what he meant himself. "**_Too_** different." 

__

Too different? "In a bad or a good way?" asked the youkai. 

Their eyes locked in a tense, deep exchange of incomprehensible questioning for a long minute. "I don't know," Kurama admitted at last. 

Hiei nodded and shifted his gaze to the ceiling, focusing on the darker shadows in the corners. The Youko seized the sudden freedom from their staring to lie down on the mattress, as far from Hiei's body as the narrow bed permitted. 

There was no night breeze. The sheets felt sticky, the house was dead quiet, and the earth missed the rain of days before. On the windowsill, the Dark Chapter had its outline sharply drawn against the light. 

When Kurama spoke again, his voice was so distant and empty that it appeared to blend with the silence, without breaking it. 

"You are not what I want." 

In the back of his mind, Hiei watched the words and the silence plunging together into his heart's black still waters, without a single ripple on the surface. _Welcome home_, the heart chanted in a derisive whisper. 

They lay mute and motionless for one hour yet, growing at each second more and more uncomfortable with each other and the universe. But Hiei waited until the chanting inside him turned into an annoying whistle in his ears - _What do you want? Why?_ - to get out of the bed and dress up. His clothes felt wonderful on his skin, familiar and protective. Too bad that he had lost his cloak inside Itsuki's void-creature. He would have to sew a new one again. 

Moving to the window, he put on his boots, grabbed his sword and the tape, and halted, wondering if there was a proper way to say goodbye. However, he quickly dismissed the idea. He and Kurama were still going to meet each other, even if not as lovers. Or friends. The life wheel moved on irremediably, untouched by those little endings and tiny broken hearts. 

And Hiei, haunted by the demanding whistle from the far off yesterday, had now to decide for how long he would still be moving on with it. 

****

~*~ Owari ~*~

__

July 30th, 2000

****

This story is part of the [**Eien no Hakusho**][2]** timeline.**

   [1]: mailto:morgan_d_@hotmail.com
   [2]: http://www.geocities.com/morgan_d_br/eien/eien.html



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